Everyone’s wrists were bound by darkness. Emory’s first instinct was to look for the umbra, but the creature of nightmare wasn’t here. She glanced down at her own hand, but it was unmarred by the shadows, and for a second, she thought she was the one doing this, that her magic had acted against her will. But it was still waiting for her beck and call in her veins.
Virgil swore again, and when Emory looked at him, the darkness had seeped into his mouth, his eyes, just as the umbrae had done to Jordyn—
His hand finally wrenched free of the rock. Those black tendrils wrapped around him in a viselike grip, and he fell like a deadweight at her feet, just as the others around him did.
All of them except for Emory—and two others.
Lizaveta took her hand away from the Hourglass. Her other hand gripped Keiran’s wrist—amplifying his magic as darkness spilled from him.
Darkness, not light.
Keiran stepped back from the Hourglass and away from Lizaveta’s amplifying touch. The darkness flowing from his hand fell away to wisps of nothing.
“What just happened?” Emory swept wide eyes over the five bodies—Virgil, Ife, Nisha, Javier, and Louis—sprawled on the cave floor, gagged by these strange ropes of darkness. She frowned incomprehensibly at Keiran, then Lizaveta. “What did you do to them?”
Lizaveta looked away as if in shame.
“They’re fine, Ains,” Keiran said softly. “Just put to sleep.”
Emory glanced at the Hourglass. The lock she’d seen appear in its middle was gone. “We were so close. The door was about to open—I could feel it.”
“And it will. When the tide comes in, it’ll open just like it did last time.”
“I don’t get it.” She pointed at the bodies at her feet. “Why do this?”
Lizaveta held herself rigidly, still avoiding eye contact—and unusually quiet.
“Keiran.” Emory searched his face for an answer, trying to reason away the creeping dread crawling along her skin. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“If we’re to call the Tides back from the Deep,” he said with a pained expression, “others need to take their place. To keep the Shadow contained.”
“What are you saying?”
“It’s like in Song of the Drowned Gods, Ains. The drowned gods needed the heroes to take their place.”
Horror struck her. The unconscious bodies around her… he meant to offer them up as sacrifices to the Deep—to doom them to an eternity watching over the Shadow.
She thought those might be tears glistening in Keiran’s eyes, but his jaw was set with resignation, his mind made up.
Emory stumbled back, denial making her limbs go numb. She looked between Keiran and Lizaveta. They couldn’t possibly be willing to sacrifice the others’ lives for this—their friends. Virgil with his mischievous smiles and booming laughter. Nisha’s constant kindness and Ife’s steadfast presence. Louis and Javier’s quiet way of gravitating toward each other, their stolen kisses whenever they thought no one was looking.
“No,” she said. “There has to be another way.”
“There isn’t. The Tides need replacements—just as they need a vessel.”
“What do you mean, a vessel?”
“The Tides need to be reunited in a single vessel to come back from the Deep. A mortal body to leave that immortal place—one that is strong enough to contain their ancient power, hold all the moon’s might inside.”
Emory was slow to process his words. “And you think that’s me?”
“Your magic is keyed to each of the Tides. You’re the Shadow of Ruin reborn—the Tidecaller given flesh. The very symbol that stole the Tides’ power from them, the reason they needed to disappear into the Deep.”
Emory’s ears rang as blood rushed to her head and she understood what he meant to do. “Keiran…”
“I’m sorry, Ainsleif.” There was a softness in his voice she hadn’t counted on. “The only way to set our lunar magics free, to reclaim the full might of the power that was once ours, is for the Tides to eradicate the stain of the Shadow and all of those who carry a piece of his power.”
It was never about her, she realized. Keiran getting close to her, seducing her—it was about the magic in her blood and the way he might wield it. You asked me why I’m not afraid of you, he’d said. The truth is, I am. But only because I see your potential. Your power.
Her eyes found Lizaveta’s. They gleamed in a way that said, I tried to warn you. And she had—had told her not to confuse Keiran’s interest in her with his obsession with power—but Emory had thought it mere jealousy on her part.
“Baz was right about you.” Emory hated the way her voice trembled. How small it was. Tears burned her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. “This is about what happened to your parents, isn’t it? You said you didn’t blame Eclipse-born for their deaths, but you do, don’t you? All this time, this was about revenge.”
“It’s about justice,” Lizaveta said, though her voice lacked its usual vehemence.
“Justice and revenge are the same when you’re willing to sacrifice all these lives for it.”
Lizaveta’s throat bobbed. “It’s the price we have to pay to see Farran again. To see our parents, too.”
Emory hoped Keiran would deny it all. He couldn’t meet her eye as he said, “You’re right, it did start out as revenge. After our parents’ deaths, Farran’s idea to wake the Tides… It fueled our thirst for justice. Our parents thought the world would be a better place with the Tides returned, with the stain of the Shadow removed, and we believed it too. The Eclipse-born are a perversion, Ains. You were never meant to have this magic. You wrested it from the Tides, and that’s why none of you can control it. Why you end up Collapsing and killing us in the process.”
Tidethief.
The word echoed in the silence around them.
The look in Keiran’s eyes turned fierce and smoldering. “But you’re different than the others, Ains. You hold the key to ridding the world of the Shadow’s stain. And by becoming the Tides’ vessel, you’ll be freed of that curse. The magic running through your veins won’t be the Shadow’s anymore but the Tides’。 You’ll be spared their wrath and made into something new and sacred and formidable.”
Keiran took a tentative step toward her. “So yes. It did start out as revenge, but it became so much more than that. I saw your power, the heart you put in everything you do, and I knew you were meant for something greater. I knew you were worth saving.”
Emory thought she might die from the ache in her chest. She balled her hands into fists at her side to keep her heart from shattering any further. “So everything else—bringing Romie and Farran and the others back from the Deep… It was all a lie so you could use me against my own House? And what—save my soul from damnation in the process?”
“It wasn’t a lie,” Lizaveta said. “It’s the whole reason I agreed to this in the first place. I couldn’t care less about saving your fucking soul. But whoever frees the Tides might obtain their blessing, and with it, we’ll bring them back. It’s what the four of us promised each other back in Trevel.”